


This One's Mine

by kay_emm_gee



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Broadway, F/M, Hamilton - Freeform, Musicals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-11
Updated: 2016-04-11
Packaged: 2018-06-01 18:16:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6530854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kay_emm_gee/pseuds/kay_emm_gee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Opening night for the new Hamilton cast is drawing closer, but Raven still can't seem to pull off her character's climatic song. She doesn't particularly want to dig into why because that would bring up memories of a love best left in the past. Still, she can't fail the cast or the crew, or most of all herself. </p><p>Even so, when Wells offers to help, she is reluctant to let him, but he is just as stubborn as she is, apparently.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This One's Mine

**Author's Note:**

> I was listening to 'Burn' and it felt very much like a Raven Reyes song.

She wasn’t wearing a corset in truth, but the dark pink dress still felt like it had laces and stiff fabric that wrapped around her chest, cutting off the air to her lungs. The theater was silent, the rest of the cast and crew having disappeared as rehearsal had ended long ago. Yet here Raven still was, on stage and in costume. In her hand she clutched the prop letter and hating that she knew exactly why she could never seem to nail this scene.

Well--not never. She had outdone herself performing it during her final round of auditions. From the first line of the song, Raven had let herself feel it, roll around in the rawness of it, how close it was to her own heart. She sang, and she thought of Finn, and she thought of the after, of breaking down and building herself up and falling apart and putting herself back together. She relived one of the most painful parts of her past during that audition; it was what had gotten her the part.

Unfortunately, it was going to make her fail the part. The closer her opening night came, the farther she pushed those driving memories away. It was too much to dive into them every time, even when she needed it most. Even now, when the director and even other members of the cast looked at her doubtfully, as if she would make the whole show crash and burn with her.

The letter crinkled in her hand as she crushed it tighter. Her eyes burned as she stared out at the empty audience. Raven hated the tears, and where they came from; she hated failure more.

With rustling skirts, she stood and wiped her cheeks dry. The first line came to her again-- _I saved every letter you wrote to me_ \--for another try, even if everyone else was gone.

She made it through the first chorus before cutting herself off with a hoarse shout of frustration. Her tone was fine, her timing was fine, everything was just fine. Except for the fact that the song sounded entirely flat, lacking the heartbreak need to make it transcendent.

“You need accompaniment?”

Raven whipped her head around to find Wells standing in the wings. Fury and embarrassment made more tears well up, which she quickly dabbed away.

“No.”

“I’m all for _a capella_ practice, but really--”

“I’m fine,” she snapped.

He frowned and stepped forward onto the stage. “No, you’re not.”

She glared at him as he took off his coat and set it on her bench. He was wearing jeans and a blue sweater, which looked extremely weird to her after seeing him in colonial garb for most of the past week.

“Worried I’m going to tank the show with my incompetence?”

He chuckled. “I don’t think anyone would ever call you incompetent. And we both know you’re spectacular in this role.”

She scoffed under her breath, and he rolled his eyes before saying, “Alright, maybe a little less than spectacular when it comes to _Burn._ But we’re going to fix it.”

“We’re?”

He just grinned at her again and walked backwards until he was at the edge of the stage. She watched warily as he dug his phone out of his pocket, thumbed through it, and then looked back up at her.

When the instrumental version of the song started to play--tinny and too faint for a theater but loud enough for their ears--she closed her eyes, ignoring the painful pressure in her chest. She was a beat late to start, and Wells started the song back at the beginning. Sighing, she started on the correct count this time, but after she finished the second verse he restarted it again.

“What?” She asked, frowning.

“Wasn’t right.”

“Really.”

“You telling me it was?”

Raven considered him suspiciously, because there was no derision to his voice, just patience and kindness. “Fine. You gonna tell me how to get it right.”

Shaking his head, he replied, “No. Only you know how to do that.”

“Then what are you doing here?”

“Just sing, Raven.”

She ignored the flutter in her stomach at the way he spoke her name and motioned for him to press play. When he obliged with another smile, she let a little bit of the pain burst through the dam she had built up since her audition. His smile grew wider, letting her know to keep going. The further into the song she went, though, the more her chest ached until it grew too sharp. She lost track of her breathing patterns, then stumbled over the words.

“Damn it!” She cried out, throwing her hands up in the air. “Damn it.”

Wells started forward, concerned, but she halted him with a flex of her fingers.

“Raven,” he said again, and the flutter grew. “I saw your audition tape.”

“How did you get that?” She muttered.

“Sinclair is an old family friend.”

This time he was the one who raised his hands, in defense from her glare.

“You were _spectacular_ in there,” he said slowly, heavily, eye glinting with something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. “And you will be again.”

“Easy for you to say. Sinclair was practically glowing after your rehearsal today.”

Wells shrugged, suddenly looking uncomfortable. “It was a good rehearsal.”

“No, it was spectacular,” she said, letting her tone slip towards teasing.

A jerk of his head, a quick consideration, and then he was quirking a half-smile at her. “Look at that. I think Raven Reyes just gave me a compliment.”

“I’m just trying to butter you up so you’ll help me.”

“I was already helping you.”

His growing grin made it hard for her not to smile too. “Shut up and play it again.”

Two more tries, and she was getting better but not good enough. At every flare of frustration, she found herself looking to Wells and his reassuring gaze.

When she swore after another lackluster attempt, she froze when he asked, “Who’s Finn?”

“What?”

“You said, ‘damn it, Finn’. So who’s Finn?”

“Nobody.”

“Uh-huh.”

“He was--” Raven paused, choking up. Finn was everything to her at one point, but he had been nothing for a long time. Until the audition, he had been nothing, but now he was something again--the thing that stood in the way of the everything she now wanted. “He was--he was a guy.”

“Ah.” Where most people pitied her once they understood, Wells only sounded sorry and strangely, a little bit pleased.

Raven squinted at him and the sudden relaxation on his face. “What?”

“So he was the guy. _The_ guy. The one that made you kill your audition.”

“He didn’t do shit in that audition. That was all me!”

Wells grinned. “Good. I knew that, and now I know that you know that too.”

“You’re being kind of a dick.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Kind of.”

“No, I’m being helpful.”

Raven bit her lip, wishing she could scowl at his half-grin. Instead, she just felt at ease.

His expression softened and he said quietly, “Go back to the beginning, Raven. Go back.”

She gritted her teeth against the flash of memories--a _little boy with brown hair and kind eyes offering her a snack on the playground. Sharing crayons and giggling on monkey bars. Crying into the sleeping bag he always left out for her, never sure when she would knock on his window and need to spend the night._

Swearing under her breath, she breathed deeply, rolling back the deluge of good-before-bad.

“Raven?”

“Play,” she demanded.

She sang it all the way through but even as she finished, she knew. “Too soft.”

Wells nodded in agreement. “So fast forward.”

_A cheap dress and a streamer-filled dark gym, sitting in the passenger seat of his car with warmth in her chest, then warmth on her lips as he kissed her. Fingers intertwined and notes passed between classes. Mascara and car grease smeared on her hands, his hands, all over their skin. Graduation caps and long phone calls, then missed phone calls and sharp accusations. A cowardly goodbye and crying into pillows, missing him and hating him and loving him still even if he didn’t love her, not the way she wanted._

“Hey.”

Raven sobbed then wavered her head, letting the pain and tension flow through her.

“ _Hey_.”

Solid hands rested on her shoulders, then solid arms wrapped around her. She melted into his embrace, not quite crying but still overwhelmed. It was old pain searing through her, the type that wasn’t quite real but not quite enough of a phantom to ignore. It pissed her off that she could still feel like this, be like this after so much time. It made her sad, too, that the good was tainted by the bad, still, even now after healing.

Wells tightened his arms around her. A soft hum went through him, one that Raven felt thrum into her own bones. It made her smile, that tiniest piece of music, barely more than a few notes.

“You can do this,” he finally murmured into her hair. “You can _do this._ ”

She nodded into his chest, fingers clutching briefly at the fabric of his sweater before she pulled away.

“I can do this,” she repeated firmly.

He dipped his head to catch her eye and breathe with her one last time before stepping back. Raven breathed and closed her eyes and nodded. The music played, and she sang, and then--oh, then she smiled.

* * *

 

She didn’t smile the next day in rehearsal because it wasn’t a smiling song. After, though, she couldn’t stop smiling. Her voice was hoarse and the corners of her mouth hurt from how wide her grin stayed through her cast members’ whistles and the applause of the directors.

Raven was still smiling when she approached Wells backstage. He looked ridiculous with his suspenders dragging and breeches pulled halfway down his legs. When he looked up and saw her, he choked on his sip of water a little bit.

“Hey,” he coughed.

“Need some help?”

He cleared his throat twice more before managing a reassuring grin. “Really, I’m good.”

“Do you want something a little stronger than water?”

“What?”

Raven laughed at his surprise. “I’m asking if you want to get a drink with me sometime.”

“Like after rehearsal?”

Raising her eyebrows, she bit her lip as she waited for him to figure it out. When his eyes lit up in pleased understanding, she laughed again, softer this time.

“Yeah,” he said, reaching out to grab her hand and squeeze. “Yeah I’d definitely love to grab a drink with you.”

Her mouth was hurting again from how big her smile was. “It’s a date.”

With one last brush of her thumb over his knuckles, she turned away and singing under her breath--

_I’m so into you, I’m **h e l p l e s s**._

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading :)


End file.
